Women’s struggle for the vote through text, photographs, and quilt block. Text inspired by an article on women’s suffrage by Minna Morse in The Smithsonian, 1993.

From the artist’s statement: “I choose to create what I feel will be beautiful and bring pleasure. That does not preclude having a powerful message…Most of my work is done with what might be considered ‘women’s work’: embroidery, quilting, beading, etc. I do this intentionally to show that there is merit and power in these techniques and because I enjoy working this way…The book formats I use allow me to do pieces that are sculptural with strong visual images as well as written components…”

Photographs from the Library of Congress, Oregon Historical Society, Smithsonian, and Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College. Flag book bound in concertina style, opening to reveal twenty-one card leaves in three horizontal rows, each leaf with text/printed photograph on one side and illustration of a postage stamp on a ground of printed patchwork on the other. Boards of printed patchwork with floral lilac fabric border. Edition of one hundred and twenty-five copies. University of Utah copy is no. 45, signed by the author.

Pages: U.S. edition comprised of two volumes; volume one with 312 pages and volume two with 322 pages. G.B. edition is single volume containing 380 pages. U.S. edition contains six full page illustrations; G.B. edition contains fifty full page illustrations.

Call Number: PS2954 U5 E52a (U.S.) / PS2954 U5 1852 (G.B.)

U.S. First Edition, Illustration, Page 62

Early Great Britain Edition, Illustration, Page 125

When Harriet Beecher Stowe conceived Uncle Tom’s Cabin during the early 1850’s she was living in Cincinnati, Ohio, at the time part of the western frontier. Living in Cincinnati, directly across the Ohio River from the slave state of Kentucky, Stowe was exposed to fugitive slaves and often heard firsthand accounts of the horrors experienced by formerly enslaved people. Sympathetic to their suffering, she wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin to expose the tragedies she was hearing about and included many aspects of the firsthand accounts she had heard into the story.

In her concluding remarks Stowe assures us the story is based on true events. She wrote,

“The writer has often been inquired of, by correspondents from different parts of the country, whether this narrative is a true one; and to the inquiries she will give one general answer.

The separate incidents that compose the narrative are to a very great extent authentic, occurring, many of them, either under her own observation or that of her personal friends. She or her friends have observed characters and the counterparts of almost all that are here introduced; and many of the sayings are word for word as heard herself, or reported to her.”

Stowe’s story from the backwoods of the western frontier became immediately successful throughout the country and quickly thereafter throughout the Western Hemisphere. Initially released as a weekly serial in a newspaper called The National Era from June 1851 to April 1852, Uncle Tom’s Cabin was then printed by John P. Jewett and released March 20, 1852. It sold 3,000 copies the first day, 10,000 copies in the first week, and in the United States 300,000 copies the first year. In Great Britain 200,000 copies were sold the first year, with sales there reaching 1.5 million copies after only a few years. Many of these were infringing, or pirated, editions, having been printed and sold without permission by the copyright owner.

In today’s terms we would say Uncle Tom’s Cabin went viral overnight. Stowe ignited a spark with her writing that caused flames to rise on multiple continents. Her novel brought compassion to the heated economic debate already centuries old, an emotion many had worked hard to suppress. The pen and paper Stowe put to incredible use in a city on the edge of the American frontier played an unquestionable role in history. Ten years after the novel’s publication, when U.S. President Abraham Lincoln met Stowe in 1862, he remarked, “So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war!”

Stowe’s concluding admonition in the novel’s final comments is a strong rebuke on the nation and, as seen by the popularity of Uncle Tom’s Cabin in Great Britain, was found completely fitting for application on the world at the time as a whole. She wrote,

“Not by combining together to protect injustice and cruelty, and making a common capital of sin, is this Union to be saved – but by repentance, justice, and mercy; for not surer is the eternal law by which the millstone sinks in the ocean, than that stronger law by which injustice and cruelty shall bring on nations the wrath of Almighty God!”

Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin as a critique on the most divisive topic of her time more than one hundred and sixty years ago. Holding these historic editions and reading these words helps us to realize that even after all this time there is a great deal left to accomplish in protecting justice and mercy. Little wonder millions of copies of Uncle Tom’s Cabin have been sold; perhaps a few million more need to be.

Libretto by Nahum Tate to music by Henry Purcell. Compact disc of the opera inserted, performed by the Taverner Choir and Taverner Players, conducted by Andrew Parrott. Book structure and box designed by Claire Van Vliet. Three overlapping sections of accordion-fold paperwork landscape collage with five varying and irregular-sized text pamphlets sewn into each of five openings. The book can be stood in a line or in a star-circle. Housed in a black cloth tray case with paper spine label. Compact disc is in a chemise in a pocket at the front. A rear pocket contains an empty chemise for the owner’s own CD. Printed in honor of the 300th anniversary Nahum Tate’s libretto. The first publication of the libretto was probably distributed to the audience at the first performance of the piece, which celebrated the coming of William and Mary to the English throne in 1689. Edition of one hundred and fifty copies. University of Utah copy is no. 49.

The Rare Books Department, J. Willard Marriott Library, The University of Utah invites students, faculty, and community members to visit the Special Collections Reading Room (Level 4), where you can hold history in your hands.

The ten commandments of the Old Testament in Latin, Czech, English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and Slovak designed as a cross.

Master bookbinder Jan Bohuslav Sobota (1939-2012) was born in Czechoslovakia. He studied binding in Pilzen and Prague until 1957. In 1982 he defected to Switzerland. He took his family to the United States in 1984, where he worked as a conservator at Case Western Reserve University before going to Bridwell Library, where he was Director of the Conservation Laboratory from 1990 to 1997. He and his family returned to the Czech Republic in 1997

Handmade paper printed in gold. Bound in pale turquoise morocco with binder’s blindstamped monogram on rear cover, upper cover with colored morocco inlays, comprising a central square cross. Issued in gold pouch. Edition of one hundred copies, numbered and signed by the artists. University of Utah copy is no. 6.

Beverage list from “John’s Rendezvous,” a San Francisco restaurant opened by John Sobrato at 50 Osgood Place during the Prohibition. By the 1940s the restaurant had gained a reputation for its food and was considered by many the best restaurant in San Francisco. Among its many patrons were movie stars and giants of the film industry. After John’s death in 1953, his wife sold the restaurant.

This wine list was mailed to interested patrons at the height of the restaurant’s fame. Its style is representative of the late Art Deco period. Printed on cardstock, with foreword and tribute pages preceding six tabbed sections delineating the various liquor options served, including Mixed Drinks and Sweet Wines; California Wines, Imported Wines, Champagnes and Sparkling Wines; Cordials and After Dinner Drinks; and Mineral Waters, Ales & Beers. Each tabbed leaf is illustrated with an orange, brown, and cream silhouette of a semi-nude woman posing with a specific piece of appropriate glassware, followed by a price list of drink options. Each section has a paragraph or two about the type of wine or liquor. Spiral bound with metallic copper paper wrappers.

Kay Nielsen, known best for his haunting, whimsical fairy tale illustrations, also painted stage scenery for the Royal Danish Theatre. In the late 1930s, Nielsen left Copenhagen for a career in Hollywood. He worked for the Walt Disney Company from 1937 to 1941. For Disney, Nielsen illustrated “Ave Maria” and “Night on Bald Mountain,” sequences for the movie Fantasia. Bound in three quarter leather with marbled boards and endpapers and raised spine.